Friday 22nd May saw Ireland voting on the subject of legalising gay marriage. 
Ireland are the first country in the World to gauge the peoples opinions on the matter via a public vote.
The UK legalised gay marriage back in 2013, but the people of the UK were not given a say as the vote was in the hands of Parliament. Northern Ireland was not part of the UK referendum on gay marriage.
Ireland is a heavily Catholic country and so today’s announcement of a YES vote would be fundamental in achieving equality in Ireland and moving away from the religious basis that they have. The Irish Press have been said to have been biased towards the yes vote, publishing three times more yes articles than no. However, despite the media playing a big role in the ways that people think and vote, there are many people whose ideas would have been set in place way before the referendum even came about.
The stances of the churches are currently unclear, and it will be at their own discretion as to whether they offer Gay Marriages as an option or not. As the votes continue to come in and be counted, it is strongly expected that the YES voters will win by a landslide, with Dublin North West have receiving a staggering 70.4% YES vote, confirmed earlier today.
The YES vote was confirmed as 28 out of 43 constituencies voted yes as of 5pm. Only one constituency voted NO, Roscommon-South Leitrim voting just over 51% against the referendum. Overall, 62% of voters, over 1.2 million people, voted YES to the referendum.
Celebs have taken to twitter to celebrate the news!
